A focus of the story is on the importance of fabrics used at a traditional Yoruba wedding and there is an extensive description of the various types of dress. Further, as is traditional among the Yoruba, the wedding couple pay for the matching dress of family and friends. As is also typical among the Yoruba, the guest list numbers in the hundreds, a hold-over from Yorubaland (and elsewhere in Nigeria) where life events include the entire community.

On August 21, South Africa’s Equality Court ruled that gratuitous displays of the Apartheid-era flag counted as hate speech and discrimination. Confronting history head on, Judge Phineas Mojapelo wrote in his ruling that the flag represents “a vivid symbol of white supremacy and black disenfranchisement and suppression,” and flying it, “besides being racist and discriminatory, demonstrates a clear intention to be hurtful.”

At independence in 1960, Lagos had an estimated population of 763,000; today it is about 13 million. Together with Lagos state, the population reaches 21 million. While Lagos is by far the largest city in Nigeria, security concerns, rural poverty, and hopes for greater economic opportunity are driving people to cities all over the country.

President Buhari is publicly asking the Federal Inland Revenue Service about its failure to meet tax-collecting targets since 2015. Nigerian Federal and state entities have borrowed so much money that debt service now consumes more than 70 percent of revenue, according to the Finance Ministry.

On August 13, Ibrahim el-Zakzaky arrived in India to receive medical treatment. Three days later, he returned to Nigeria having refused medical treatment. Upon his return, he was placed under arrest. He found his treatment in New Delhi to be unsatisfactory and objected to the tight security arrangements that had been put in place. He and some of his followers are claiming that the United States was behind his perceived poor treatment in India.